Facing Forks in the Road: Practitioners Share Difficult Moments and Lessons Learned

Essential Partners has been facilitating dialogue about pressing, heated issues for the past 25 years. We're about public conversations, though, not perfect conversations. To that end, we're exploring those moments when we've turned to stone in group processes when challenged, overwhelmed, or faltering?

To start off, we asked our expert associates two important questions:

1) What was one of your most mortifying moments as a facilitator? What made it so difficult?

2) What was your greatest lesson or takeaway from that moment?

Dave Joseph, Senior Associate

Several years ago, I was asked to help a college begin to establish more of a "dialogic culture." There had been a precipitating event prior to the new Dean's arrival, that involved a professor voicing pro-life sentiments being shouted down. The new Dean wanted a "do over," and we talked about the idea of doing a "live" dialogue on stage, in front of an audience, on the same subject, i.e abortion. This particular professor was part of the planning process, which involved a small group.

So I innocently assumed (first mistake) that in our planning process, I had sufficiently clarified differences between debate and dialogue and that we shared a common purpose. It turned out that rather than several proponents of both positions (pro-life and pro-choice), as originally intended, the event ended up being a one-to-one dialogue with the professor and a pro-choice community person. I spent some time on the phone with the community person orienting her and felt like she would be a great participant. Since the professor had been part of the planning process, I didn't do a usual EP preparatory interview with him (second mistake).  The public "dialogue" involved our typical three questions of personal experience/heart of the matter/complexities and gray areas.

Then I explained the next section, when they would be able to pose questions to each other and invited the professor to begin by asking "do you have some things that you would like to understand better about B's perspective?" He replied straightforwardly "no," and sat silently. I was so flabbergasted in front of the audience of close to 100 people, with the video cameras rolling, that I have no idea what I did next. My two EP colleagues who were present, assured me that I responded with grace, respect and aplomb as I unsuccessfully tried to involve him, with modest success. Fortunately the community person was quite gracious and took the opportunity to express her uncertainties, her questions and to engage wholeheartedly.

What did I learn/what would I do differently? The next time I plan to do a "dialogue" in front of an audience, I would do the same thing that we typically do and I neglected, in this instance. That is to say, I would make sure to clarify the purpose of the participants, their understanding of the intention of the experience and to invite them to prepare questions that would help them better understand the other person's viewpoint and questions that they would hope to ask in order that they might become more fully known in the way that they experience themselves. 

Bob Stains, Senior Associate

After many months of planning and on the eve of a dialogue, the planned process and our suitability as facilitators were publicly challenged in an email sent by one participant to the rest of the group. What to do? To respond directly ran the risk of being or seeming defensive; to not respond may have meant being a bystander to making things worse than they had been before planning started if the dialogue was canceled.

Lesson learned: turn it over to the group and let go. Other members vouched for us and the inclusiveness of the planning process while stating their intention to be part of the dialogue. The person who wrote the email became one of the most powerful contributors to the dialogue.